“For much too lengthy the USA has minted pennies which accurately value us greater than 2 cents. That is so wasteful!” Trump wrote in a put up on Reality Social.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump says he has directed the Treasury Division to cease minting new pennies, citing the rising value of manufacturing the one-cent coin.
“For much too lengthy the USA has minted pennies which accurately value us greater than 2 cents. That is so wasteful!” Trump wrote in a put up Sunday evening on his Reality Social website. “I’ve instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to cease producing new pennies.”
The transfer by Trump is the most recent in what has been a rapid-fire effort by his new administration to enact sweeping change by means of government order and proclamation on points starting from immigration, to gender and variety, to the title of the Gulf of Mexico.
Trump had not mentioned his need to remove the penny throughout his marketing campaign. However Elon Musk’s so-called Division of Authorities Effectivity raised the prospect in a put up on X final month highlighting the penny’s value.
The U.S. Mint reported shedding $85.3 million within the 2024 fiscal 12 months that led to September on the almost 3.2 billion pennies it produced. Each penny value almost $0.037 — up from $0.031 the 12 months earlier than.
The mint additionally loses cash on the nickel, with every of the $0.05 cash costing almost $0.14 to make.
It’s unclear whether or not Trump has the facility to unilaterally remove the lowly one-cent coin. Foreign money specs — together with the scale and steel content material of cash — are dictated by Congress.
However Robert Okay. Triest, an economics professor at Northeastern College, has argued that there is perhaps wiggle room.
“The method of discontinuing the penny within the U.S. is just a little unclear. It could probably require an act of Congress, however the Secretary of the Treasury would possibly be capable to merely cease the minting of latest pennies,” he mentioned final month.
Members of Congress have repeatedly launched laws taking intention on the zinc coin with copper plating. Proposals through the years have tried to briefly droop the penny’s manufacturing, remove it from circulation, or require that costs be rounded to the closest 5 cents, in accordance with the Congressional Analysis Service.
Proponents of eliminating the coin have cited value financial savings, speedier checkouts at money registers, and the truth that plenty of nations have already eradicated their one-cent cash. Canada, for example, stopped minting its penny in 2012.
It would not be the primary time the U.S. eradicated its least useful coin. The half-cent coin was discontinued by Congress in 1857.
Trump’s new administration has been sharply targeted on reducing prices, with Musk, who has been introduced on to guide the duty, focusing on total businesses and enormous swaths of the federal workforce as he tries to determine a aim of $2 trillion in financial savings.
“Let’s rip the waste out of our nice nations funds, even when it’s a penny at a time,” Trump wrote in his put up.
Trump despatched the message as he was departing New Orleans after watching the primary half of the Tremendous Bowl.
